struggles to meet the vital for a bailout ahead of monday's deadline with schools of savings facing the prospect of chunks of money for the sake of rescuing the country's ailing banks. u.k. police say there were no signs of any third party involvement in the death of russian tycoon he said to repent of his. return to his homeland. the syrian national coalition chief announces his resignation raising the dramatic divisions within the assad forces. starving to death in protest and definite detention as noise from hunger strike detainees plague. us military denies a crisis. facility.

in the back of the seven days leading stories and the latest developments this is the weekly. is stuck between a rock and a hard place ahead of monday's deadline to raise five point eight billion euros needed to secure and. avoid a banking collapse the government has produced a plan that could potentially see scores of people lose up to a fifth of their life savings for the sake of rescuing the banks prospect caused panic and discontent across cyprus this week with crowds venting their anger on the streets. has this report. in a dramatic week of unfolding events cyprus has moved from rejected europe with a resounding no vote on what it saw as an unfair demand for getting

a ten billion euro bailout to now bending over backwards trying to clinch that money scrambling to put together a package pleasing enough to its creditors the so-called troika now saying yes to imposing a twenty percent levy on deposits above one hundred thousand euros in the bank of cyprus and four percent for big deposits in other banks imposing capital controls creating a so we did a fund and a restructuring it's a when banks and in that week of dramatic political and economic maneuvering citizens were on an emotional roller coaster panicked cypriots rushed to a.t.m. to try and get their money out of the bank at gas stations and no cash meant no gas i agree people took to the streets shocked at what they largely felt was europe particularly germany trying to bring them to their knees but it was a home how they would pay us and our kids. we don't accept it's a sight all too familiar in next door greece but for the first time in the euro

zone string of be allowed to bear it's a red line had been crossed what is going to bite this particular instance is that the european union the euro zone have taken a step forward beyond their previous policy where they always said individuals will not be harmed we will not take money out of moises enchanters and actually they've done that what we see is that if you're a big member then you will be left alone and you will be bailouts and you if you are small member you will be beleaguered r us to further complicate matters banks in the country will remain closed until next week and the european central bank had given an ultimatum if there's no deal with the troika by monday the twenty fifth emergency liquidity funding will be cut off causing another round of panic as citizens feared the worst. holding on to as much cash as they could most conversations now are about nothing else but the predicament their countries it.

is a possibility but the real support to be able to. see. what everybody has what happened next or cup and then you go before people see your club. and whatever they could they don't think twice about joining the crowd at the time it's within your letters. if you came to one thing i think those are. well over the past few days maybe cypriots have been telling me that they've seen or read about the impact of the economic crisis on the people of neighboring greece but it's not a really felt feel to them well not until the past week or so they share similar language or similar culture and other wondering are they going to have to share a similar social tragedy as well. tests are still here r t nicosia cyprus.

and as you wrote it says that the damage to the ship economy is already done regardless of what the government and finance ministers decide. this is exactly the same government that we're talking about the had accepted only a few days ago a catastrophic plan that was dictated by the euro group who were negotiating only be only for it to be rejected by this improved parliament so why would anyone believe them this time around the country if you know a way of getting out of this mess by this point to be honest or at least in the medium or even the short and i don't think there's any sustainable way way out as you may have read already as you may already know the world bank as well as you warned. that risk for a contagion of us if it quiets is another thing that's so it's the risk of thing that's becoming more and more a very strong possibility and also so it doesn't really matter whether whether these actually whether measures are implemented or not and whether that's a big if you know twenty twenty five percent which is pretty much the subject of a discussion of the your group meeting and the really important thing is that the trust banking system been breached already and

a bank run by now thinking as you know it will no matter what happens tonight and if your father sees a professor of political economy at the university of nicosia believes that would be dark repercussions to the support nation if it didn't comply with the street bailout terms. there is a political willingness by the government to reach an agreement for the bailout with the troika but it seems that they're making it more and more difficult with you in new demands they fear that exists in case that all demands of the trade got accepted i mean it would be very difficult for these under one of these agreement to be viable in the sense that it will throw the country huge fiscal cliff and the huge recession and the vicious circle and it will be extremely difficult if not impossible to get out of it this is unprecedented cyprus lost twenty five percent

of its g.d.p. almost two years ago when there was the here a couple of the greek dead and there has been no compensation for that if these ideas being discussed are implemented there will be another hearing of the cyprus g.d.p. which will be around forty percent it will be impossible i think to get out of such a mess british police say there's no evidence of any party involvement in the death of self exiled russian tycoon and vocal kremlin critic but he's put his off scheme by has an experts went to his home near london where he was found dead but have given the all clear a correspondent said as far as arafat is at the scene. the thames valley police continuing the investigation into the cause of death of course burzynski which still remains unexplained on the c.b.r. and team that's the team of officers trained in handling radioactive material he had been at the scene joining the investigation they've now given the all clear say

they've left the investigation and the cordon the can see behind me here that had spanned two miles around. just to the lane where his home is now as a huge amount of speculation surrounding the death was a larger than life character the russian had made his fourteen after the break up of the save the union we know that in recent years he had been struggling psychologically and financially he had a number of high profile cases in britain the most recent of which he lost against fellow roman abramovich and when you listen to people here in the courthouse at the time of that it certainly seems that that had a very significant impact on him indeed as he said not just psychologically but financially as well and it does look like he was struggling with that and a lot of relatives a lot of friends of boris berezovsky have come out and speculated about his mental

state at the time of his death we've also heard from the russian president's press attash a he said that months ago a the president received a letter from various we can take a listen now to what that said. sometime ago maybe some two months ago but it's sent a letter to putin himself saying that he admits that he made a lot of mistakes and to forgive him for these mistakes and. transfer them to. this letter did exist pretty dismal the man he's wanted by british police on suspicion of the murder of alexander litvinenko. very high profile cases that continue to stay you can about there is a ski describing that this arrival saying he was in constant contact with mutual friends and also giving further insight into his mental state at the time. of it in

which he was completely alone in the last six months unfortunately birds are sick he was not thinking much of friendship himself he was keeping ties only with the men he needed with and when he took everything he could from those men and he parted with them that is why his friends have done the same thing to him we were bitter rivals but we were constantly in dialogue through our movie true friends i know for sure that he was in a deep depression and he started to evaluate many things he was missing russia living in london and he always asked people coming to visit him from moscow to bring him local food whiteboard inskeep read during the meeting with a journalist as late as friday boris berezovsky has spoken about his longing to return home to russia and talks about losing meaning to his life perhaps like further insights into the russian tycoon state of mind at the time that he died of course that police investigation to establish the cause of his that's right now. so

i will my colleague research and discussed what more will be left in history behind but he spends oscar with peter lavelle the host of cross talk here on r.t. . boris berezovsky here a man who absolutely made a fortune as they say during the ninety's or total and time he stayed in russia he stole it let's be clear here is that all it he didn't make this the event almost manipulated a million people in a manipulator ok he used the system what was happening in russia the political system had collapsed the economy had collapsed belief in authority had collapsed everything it was in collapse so he picked up pieces all the all over the place where he was he didn't generate wealth you store wealth let's be clear about who they can you can you talk about in the end because you know talking off air about the the rule of seven of bankers that came out of houses where the term came in i think was better software that invented it essentially in one thousand nine hundred six a small number of people in the community enormous wealth but they wanted more and

they said to yeltsin we'll get you reelected but you have to give me shares in state institutions bear off lot of etc etc and he did it he gave the economy away so he would over a very little had no power and because ascii was at the top of the hill so this is how he generated his wealth ok he didn't earn it but now you talk about a wealthy man you've met and there's yes ome arrogant he was full of themself ok but a lot of security around him an enormous amount of security he was paranoid for good reason there were attempts on his life and he left because he was worried for his life ok he took his money with him or at least a good part of it is called a self-imposed exile in learned it was a solicitor sleep it was an escape he left it was he would have been charged with all kinds of criminal offenses resignation self-preservation i better get out of and then revenge ok what about what about one of the you know one of the high profile cases we've had a limousine company that been named for the polonium poisoning worked for

a bit of skin so litvinenko worked with. in what capacity to look for dirt to look for dirt on politicians on college and yes of course that was his job let's let's bring it up. meeting of all bitch in court are we talking about billions you know massive legal dispute it was a really huge gamble on the part of betters of what was going to have one shred of evidence that would one sheet of paper to prove he can get caught with no paperwork absolutely why gamble so he would say he knew i am just coming you know the end is coming he was running out of money you think he was running out of money is broke because a lot of people question how much he was really worth was he worth of these three point one billion i doubt it ever you doubt it so do you think it was a call back also with a mortgage or maybe others that basically by step by step broken down he died alone interesting alone no friends is his wife a headline all respected lost his money had lost the respect he wasn't able to come home because we had heard recently that he had been trying to come back to moscow

even pending illusional delusional you think he wanted to come back on i think he wanted to come back and as for given this no it was never going to happen. or married to jet ski chief editorial writer and columnist at the independent newspaper believes that some foreign officials in britain will probably breathe a sigh of relief with one of the forms being removed from russia u.k. relations i don't think he particularly was a serious threat to the kremlin. i think that it is up fancied himself as a threat and maybe he wanted to be more of a threat than actually he was. but the position that he held through the second half of the ninety's in russia obviously made him like you figure of that period the figure of berezovsky his position when he died this weekend and the contrast between that and his position of power and influence in the late ninety's

illustrates in some ways how russia has. changed in those five ten years i think elsewhere behind the scenes in places like foreign office in the corridors of government they'll be you know i won't say they'll be doing something as improper as sort of dancing in the aisles but it is off he was a very awkward figure he was a big obstacle to diplomacy with russia and i think his death will be seen as i hope anyway as maybe removing an obstacle to better relations with russia this is the weekly here in our to you on the way this hour blackouts behind bars u.s. officials continue to play the scale of a mass hunger strike at one time of day while the pentagon now wants to expand the tourist facility the story morphy after the break stay with us if you can.

hold. its technology innovation all the developments around. the future. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harpur welcome to the big picture. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. the giant corporations rule today.

continues here in all t. the syrian national coalition has decisively rejected the resignation of its president there was a notes to step in government just months after he was elected or the port of slew has the details in his statement was outed said that he was stepping down because some matters have to quote him reached red lines now he hasn't explained exactly what prompted his resignation but he did say that he was designing to be able to work with freedom that cannot be available from official institutions keep in mind that her to it was someone that both russia and the united states look to as a person that they could negotiate with on the future of syria back in february had to admit with the russian foreign minister sergei lavrov following his claim that

the syrian opposition was ready to negotiate with the syrian president bashar assad it is important to remember that this was the first time ever that the syrian opposition talked about the possibility of tweaking to a side although later backtracked by saying that he was willing to talk about the departure of assad with his vice president and his government but not with the syrian president assad himself now tips resignation does raise questions over the integrity of the syrian national opposition coalition it comes on the heels of twelve opposition members pulling out last week over the election of a prime minister the tip has complained that there has been insufficient groundwork to actually be able to form a government what we're witnessing also is stark division amongst not a united picture at all as the opposition finding it very difficult to come to some kind of united stance on how to deal with the syrian regime with the tips stepping

down is also seen as a sign of internal divisions it is seen as a sign of anxiety and so the question remains what does his resignation. if it's to find a diplomatic solution to this conflict. there will for more analysis i'm now joined live by him he's a damascus based journalist and political commentator why. excepting the president's resignation. well first of all. he was the person who first proposed the notion of a dialogue with the syrian government and he was attacked by police to say it was ill received by most of the opposition factions the coalition or for position of the revolutionary forces which he was heading was obviously facing some serious trouble regarding its internal unity government many people who have different points of view it has the liberals it tells the people from the left side it has as

one of the fundamental something as a muslim brotherhood so it gathered many voices and those voices only came together because the united states of america thought the opposition should be united now but in fact they can't be united because they have all these different ideologies and all different ways of approaching the syrian crisis so the only way it's already a way of solving that lack of unity is any way to bring them together in because you just outlined all the different factors and interests at play here among the opposition. well unfortunately we're facing a problem with the syrian opposition similar to the one the opposition was complaining about when speaking of all the government they always come complain that the syrian government is an exclusive. government that basis for his own exclusion excluding anyone but that is not with them and this is something that the coalition of position forces and the new interim government is doing there saying we are the opposition we are present the syrian people and that anyone who says otherwise i was another approach to the issue should not be labeled as opposition

and this is a serious problem and i think it's one of the key factors behind most of its departure and i was telling you sources close to you have told me that in part not mainly in part his resignation has to do with the recent violence the three homicides are down due to that on islamic scholar and he was deeply concerned over over the death of me and maybe this personal factor along with the many factors the way his initiative was received by the rest of the opposition the situation i was the situation is evolving on the ground the bloodshed that the endless bloodshed in syria maybe all of this made him decide to step down just how much control does this opposition in exile really have over the factions of the rebels operating there in syria bearing in mind of course that many now being infiltrated by extremists linked to al qaeda. absolutely no control whatsoever and the thing the fact that the free army has said it doesn't acknowledge mr he told the

government it's a great indication the thing about the the syrian situation is that everyone is doing whatever they want like the opposition outside is doing what they want the opposition inside is doing what they want and the government is doing what it wants and the rebels are doing with their own and everyone seems to be in no way disconnected from reality no one's accepting the whole factors of reality no one is no one except the fact that he is not in full control of the situation. so i'll tell you again the opposition and the opposition body abroad they can't control the rebel forces inside and even in many protests held in syria by the opposition we've sent banners saying the revolution is taking place inside syria not on turkey and reference to they stumbled found that council the known as n.c. so i think there's a big gap between the people fighting inside and opposition forces operating from the outside and those operating from the outside of course are being presented or

supported i should say by the west isn't this very embarrassing isn't this a big blow to western powers are actually trying to support this i said see coalition. well the funny thing about the opposition is actually it's ironic not funny that in the same way the opposition has many points of view the opposition has many sponsors and every sponsor is claiming his territory like qatar has people that is sponsoring inside the coalition saudi arabia house people sponsoring turkey has its people the united states has its people the united kingdom and france and those of some of the opposition figures act accordingly to what their foreign sponsors who want them to do as a result we see more disagreement on this agreement comes not only from the national disagreement the disagreement over national causes like how to deal with events in syria it comes from the international disputes between these countries often we've seen like they are safe from really cold like a constable to a solution at some point to be contradicted by the united kingdom and france as

we've seen recently with that with that with the embargo with the weapons of bargain regarding sending weapons from the you to syria the united kingdom and france were acting in complete disengagement with all the united states was actually is declaring it was to do of course this position changed afterwards so i tell you it's not embarrassing because everyone knows that this opposite that some of the external opposition or position operating abroad is directly linked to western powers is directly. regional powers also and they will act accordingly. thanks indeed for your thoughts on labor him journalism thank you commentator on live in the masters thank you. skin and bones fainting and even coughing up blood that's how lawyers for the hunger striking going to the detainees describe some of their clients you've been starving themselves since early february some lawyers claim they are no longer given access to their clients in custody while the u.s. military continues to downplay the scale of the hunger strike and despite the

crisis the pentagon now wants expansion of the facility saying it will be open indefinitely and that is going to church can reports. despair among guantanamo detainees is growing as now even their lawyers are being denied direct access to them attorneys say they had a visit scheduled for early next week with one of the prisoners who's been on strike since the beginning of february lawyers have been informed by saudis that the only flight to the prison the u.s. military flight was cancelled we are. told there are no other options there is no right. and this is. not only are the attorney struggling to find out the true extent of what's happening in guantanamo now but we journalists are as well this friday captain robert zubrin the spokesman for guantanamo responded to our inquiry he wrote us

quote we have twenty six hunger strikers with eight receiving and total feeds meaning they get nutrition through a feeding tube last friday robert to rand wrote us there were fourteen people refusing all food while their defense attorney said been saying there were many more we cannot independently verify any of this at this point we're just relying on what the officials and detainees lawyers tell us we're certainly in touch with their attorneys and will continue to press the officials for answers in addition to the inquiries that we made with the defense department we also asked the department of justice for their perspective on what's happening and they basically told us that it's none of their business that the military oversees the facility and referred as back to the department of defense defense attorneys are telling us that these sorties have created conditions which make it nearly impossible for them to do their job and defend their clients so frustrating there is nothing that we can do we have sent e-mails to the department to berms to the commander. asking them. to talk to us about. her oh

response we have been told by the department of justice that they will not talk to us they were. part of the. norma's talked to us in the meantime in washington the officials tried to downplay the hunger strike but they seem to have a good idea of why these men resorted to such a desperate move and yet they have no solution to offer they had great optimism that guantanamo would be closed they were devastated when the president did you know backed off at least their perception of closing the facility that has caused them to become frustrated and they want to get this i think turned it up get it back in the media but it was not on the status of the detainees that general john kelly who's command oversees guantanamo came to discuss in congress he was there asking for money to renovate the prison the upgrade of the camp is estimated to cost taxpayers almost two hundred million dollars as washington schedules renovations at guantanamo the international community continues to call on

president obama to comply with his own promises and to shut down the infamous prison we have no right to hold people indefinitely without charges without a trial and without people having access to a justice system that's against every principle of law which exists in the world the un commissioner for human rights responded to our request for comment and said they have quote repeatedly regretted that the u.s. government has not closed guantanamo bay four years ago president obama ordered to stop tortured guantanamo but the u.s. says indefinite detention itself is a form of torture british resident shakur aamer was cleared for release six years ago yet he's still being held captive here's what he writes please to me in the old way here they destroy people mentally and physically without leaving marks half of the men now in guantanamo have been cleared for release many others never formally accused of a crime three months ago the state department closed the office in charge of closing the prison there's

a growing sense among the detainees there that the only way out of guantanamo for them is in a coffin in washington i'm going to check in. from energy deals to geo politics on friday china's new leaders ping made moscow his first official stop abroad and a multi-billion dollar deal struck beijing will now have more russian oil pumped into its pipes but apart from economic into dependence the china russia ties are seen as an attempt to counter a u.s. led dominance in global affairs office and he said now he has the details the job of russia china ties energy cooperation has been polished and is shining bright after a three day visit by china's xi jinping to moscow a package of deals were sealed including between rosneft and china's top energy company just a day after the russian oil giant pushed exxon mobil out of the world's number one spot the powers are set to soar with a common competitor washington.